


handle with care

by marzipan (orphan_account)



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M, The Snow Queen - Freeform, extras, iPhones, it's a sequel kinda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-12
Updated: 2018-11-25
Packaged: 2019-08-22 18:28:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16603271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/marzipan
Summary: Mycroft puts his heart into a box.extras, post-Finders Keepers





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [problematic_just_because](https://archiveofourown.org/users/problematic_just_because/gifts).



Jim flops over on top of Mycroft, who is already dead asleep, and begins his own descent into blissful slumber.

 

Ah, silence. The perfect sound to drift -

 

His eyes fly open. _Silence?_

 

Jim slaps Mycroft across the face, a loud _crack!_ that breaks the silence in as obtrusive a way as possible.

 

“Ow!” Mycroft jolts awake, too, expression more bewildered than offended, still trying to register the blow.

 

“I don’t hear anything,” Jim hisses, eyes hard. Mycroft brings his hand to his face, giving Jim a _you’re crazy_ look.

 

“Good Lord, it’s two in the morning. What did you think you would hear?”

 

“Oh, I don’t know, a _heartbeat??”_

 

Mycroft has the good sense to look a little bit contrite at that.

 

Jim grabs at his collar ( _these silly double breasted pressed pajamas of his)_ and hauls the man up, eye to eye, face an inch away.

 

“What did you do,” Jim asks again, menacing. Another thought registers, and he pulls back ever so slightly from the shock, blinking rapidly. “Or did someone take-”

 

He can’t finish his sentence.

 

Mycroft doesn’t answer, so they sort of just end up staring at each other in surprise for a long, quiet stretch of time, until Jim’s knee on Mycroft’s stomach gets really supremely uncomfortable and Mycroft has to sort of nudge him off.

 

He sighs. “I’ll go put the kettle on.”

 

.

 

Jim glares at the mug of tea passed across the table to him as if the beverage was the originator of all his woes.

 

Mycroft, comparably, looks perfectly unruffled. He sips his tea, and Jim, in retaliation, take a big gulp of his too, valiantly hiding any indication that he’d just burned his throat.

 

“Well, I was going to wait until morning, since our never-meeting schedules dictated you had to work late today,” Mycroft says, turning around to pull something out of a bag. “But I suppose I’ll give this to you now.”

 

He slides an oddly sized gift box across the table to Jim. Jim thinks his palms are definitely not sweating, it’s just that he shouldn’t have worn this stupid jumper when he got out of bed to come to Mycroft’s usually freezing kitchen. Stupid tea.

 

He scowls at Mycroft, and then grabs the box and rips off the lid.

 

And promptly throws the darn thing away from him out of shock, immediately scrambling to catch it, ending up falling out of his chair and sprawled out on the _freezing_ kitchen tile.

 

“Ow.”

 

Mycroft frowns, not getting up from his seat.

 

“Are you alright?”

 

_“No.”_

 

Jim glares up at him, a look of perfect betrayal all over his face, as he clutches the box and its fallen contents to his chest.

 

It’s a frozen _heart_.

 

At Jim’s confusion, Mycroft concedes with sympathy.

 

“I’ve a tricky meeting tomorrow and while we’ve staffed a reasonable amount of security for the event, I figured it’s best to be safe,” Mycroft explains, as Jim crawls weakly back into his chair.

 

“That’s _not better!_ ” Jim bites out. “How is that better? Oh you took your heart out, because you think you’re going to get _SHOT at?”_

 

“Well. Yes,” Mycroft says, blinking. Jim’s mouth falls open. He doesn’t know if this fool is being purposely obtuse, or if having no heart has already affected his sensibilities. Just because Mycroft is _capable_ of doing it, doesn’t mean he _should_ , Anthea had stressed.

 

And well. Jim doesn’t really want to take any chances.

 

Okay, okay he’s curious - about a lot of things. Like long term versus short term effects, of not having a heart for various periods. Could Mycroft go without it for, say, three weeks at a time, once every year? Once every six months? Two years? There were no studies on these things.

 

“And well,” Mycroft turns his mug three centimeters clockwise, and then two centimeters back. That’s a riot of fidgeting, for him. Jim narrows his eyes. “I thought maybe you could hold on to it for me.”

 

The kitchen becomes so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

 

“Are.” It comes out a bit croaky, and Jim has to stop and clear his throat, and then he stops again to take a drink of tea. “Are you asking me to protect your heart.”

 

“Please,” Mycroft says, all sincere and polite.

 

Jim blinks, rapidly, as he processes this. He takes another drink of tea, and starts as he realizes that yes, he’s been holding onto the thing this whole time. His jumper is now wet. Jim panics.

 

“Does it need to be frozen? Why’s it in a box?” Jim doesn’t know if the damn organ is going to melt, but thinks _he’s_ going to have a meltdown. “ _Why did you hand this to me_ , shouldn’t this be in your sad freezer?”

 

Mycroft sighs and looks away, if only slightly, and does his weird cup turny thing again.

 

“I thought it would be, well, symbolic.”

 

“Symbolic.” Jim stares like he’s insane. Which of the two of them, he’s not sure.

 

“Entrusting my heart to you, and all.”

 

Jim eyes are definitely not teary and his ears are _definitely not_ red as he clutches the awkward gift and croaks out a response.

 

“Yeah, okay.”


	2. Chapter 2

Jim queues up Netflix and settles his new icebox tucked next to him on the couch. He was just going to have a quiet day in, maybe arrange a few hits via text, and all would be well. Easy.

 

_ Ping! _

 

He looks down at his phone.

 

_ Sherlock Holmes is sticking his nose in that banking scandal.  _

 

_ Orders? _

 

Jim rolls his eyes and groans theatrically. He turns to regard the icebox with his woes.

 

“Of all days,” he says to it. “What are the chances, you think, that he’s doing this on purpose?”

 

_ Ping! _

 

_ Channel 4 is all over it. _

 

“Nnnnnnnnrghh,” Jim says to his phone.

 

“Sorry, I didn’t catch that,” Siri replies. 

 

“Go jump off a cliff,” Jim enunciates clearly, mouth close to the mic.

 

“Ha ha, that’s a funny one,” she says in her robotic voice.

 

He sits back on the couch, running odds on the scenario. He could skulk around pretending to be some custodial staff person at the bank’s corporate offices and  _ really _ throw Sherlock off. 

 

Or he could sit here with his silly, titanium-reinforced icebox and wait the day out like he’d planned.

 

_ Ping! _

 

_ @TheREALSherlock _

_ Lol 46mil at stake and this case doesn’t even make top ten of the most interesting ones from the past YEAR, can you imagine? Smh _

 

Jim grinds his teeth.

 

.

 

Jim pushed his wire-rimmed glasses up his nose. He felt a real affinity with these IT types, if he was being honest. So much depth to be explored, so misunderstood. Who  _ really _ knew what IT guys did, anyway? Not him. 

 

So, in a way, he reasoned, Jim himself had a lot in common with this profession. 

 

He cleared his throat, pushing the projector ahead of him, the icebox sitting securely on the bottom shelf of the thing. 

 

The board members turned around, giving him alternatively bewildered and angry looks.

 

“About time!” the big guy in the suit says. “There’s something wrong with the screen.”

 

He points the remote at the screen as he says this, angrily squeezing the power button as if that would do any good, despite the projector sensor being the little round thing affixed to the center of the ceiling.

 

Jim smiles.

 

“Brought this old trusty thing,” he says, patting the massive overhead projector. The kind you write on with erasable water-based markers, usually on sheets of plastic.

 

The corporate-types regard the machine with some disgust.

 

Sherlock and John, sitting in the corner, regard him with a shark-like smile and boiling rage, respectively. 

 

“The um. The presentation’s on a powerpoint,” an assistant-type says meekly from the back.

 

“Oh well then, go on, go print it out,” Jim says, as if that were the normal thing to do. The assistant stares back blankly. 

 

Jim rummages in the shelf beneath his paleolithic-era piece of technology and hands the assistant a messy pile of plastic sheets, only to have them spill all over the floor.

 

“If you just print them out on these, you’ll be able to show it on the screen. Er. I guess in this case, the wall,” Jim says. 

 

The assistant takes them, hesitantly, with great dismay. 

 

“Right,” they say, skeptically, before scampering off.

 

Taking this momentary pause as his cue, Sherlock rises dramatically from his armchair in the corner of the conference room.

 

“Jim Moriarty,” he says in that low voice of his, commanding attention from the board members gathered in the room. 

 

“You’ve gone soft,” he continues with some glee.

 

Jim continues plugging in the projector, making a huge ruckus about pushing chairs (board members still seated) out of the way so as to make room for the machine.

 

“I SAID,” Sherlock tries again.  

 

Jim looks up.

 

“Sorry, could you keep it down?” he asks politely.

 

“Moriarty, cut the act,” Sherlock snaps.

 

Jim turns to look over his shoulder, then back at Sherlock with much skepticism.

 

“I’m sorry, I think you’ve got the wrong number,” he says apologetically. “I mean. Sorry, I’m used to answering phones about these problems.” A nervous laugh. “Usually don’t have to go as far as bringing in new equipment. Just a ‘turn it on again!’ usually does the trick.”

 

As he babbles, Sherlock strides over and hauls the man up by his argyle sweater.

 

“Alright, what have you done, whose lives are at stake? Out with it,” Sherlock says, impatient.

 

Jim makes a sort of  _ meep _ noise, and fumbles for his lanyard. 

 

Hand shaking, glasses knocked askew, he holds it up to Sherlock’s nose. It’s a photo ID that reads William Watson. 

 

“Mr.  _ Holmes,”  _ a silver-haired woman in a plum suit says, standing. “Will you  _ please _ stop manhandling our staff?”

 

Sherlock drops him.

 

“Changed my mind. This is no simple embezzling scheme. If Moriarty is involved - and this joke of an IT disguise is  _ pathetic _ \- are you even trying anymore? I’ll have to demote you. You are no longer my arch-nemesis, you’re now nothing but a deputy nemesis,  _ step up your game!” _

 

Jim pretends to sniffle and rub his sleeve across his face. 

 

“- _ but _ , if he is involved, this was no haphazard, last-dash emptying of accounts.”

 

Sherlock circles the room, studying each of the eight board members they had gathered in the room in order to snuff out the culprit. Each had vehemently professed their innocence and jumped at the chance to prove it seeing that the others were just as ready to. 

 

In reality, Sherlock already knew it that it was Wilson, whose daughter was starting a tech firm and had asked for an angel investment, but had asked for this gathering for the drama of it.

 

But now.

 

He narrows his eyes. What had he missed?

 

“Sherlock, we’ve got to call the police,” John, ever practical, urges from the other side of the table. For what? Oh, Moriarty, in his goofball disguise, complete with an ugly lunchbox, on the floor. 

 

“What’s in there?” Sherlock reaches for the lunchbox, only to have it snatched away in the  _ most _ suspicious manner.

 

“Bologna,” Moriarty meeps again. 

 

Sherlock advances, and he cowers even further back. 

 

“Open it.”

 

“Mr. Holmes!”

 

“No!”

 

_ “Open it!” _

 

They freeze at the sound of a gun cocking, Jim and Sherlock each with their hands on the icebox, Jim’s foot against Sherlock’s shin, Sherlock’s hand shoving Jim’s chin upwards. 

 

The room, simultaneously, turns toward John Watson, who holds an unregistered firearm aimed at the poor IT fellow.

 

“Mr. Watson!” the plum suited executive reprimands. There is some real pearl-clutching going on. 

 

Jim turns big, betrayed eyes at her.

 

“Not you, the other one,” she says with some exasperation.

 

“Open the box,” John commands.

 

“No!” Jim shoots back. “It’s my box, and you - you have no business barging in here and-”

 

He starts to choke up and turn red, but internally he is rolling his eyes and  _ kicking himself _ for not just leaving the thing in a safe. What was he thinking. Safes could be cracked, but not Jim Moriarty. Well, a lot of good that did him. 

 

“Now, now,” another board member says, slowly rising to his feet and telegraphing his motions. “I think we can all just sort this out if we go on with the presentation of the annual meeting notes, as you had asked us here to do, Mr. Holmes. Now where is Benjamin? And please, for the love of God, would you put away that gun?”

 

The door bursts open and unfortunately for the pacifist board member, it was not Benjamin, but the security staff brandishing firearms of their own, after a third board member had pressed the silent alarm. The big one.

 

“Drop your weapons!”

 

“It just the one,” a board member says unhelpfully. They’re all getting down on the ground and John, grimacing, is torn between complying and keeping his pointed at Moriarty, lest the crafty bastard gets away.

 

“That man holding the box is a wanted criminal!” John calls back in lieu of complying.

 

Half the security turn their guns on Sherlock.

 

“No, not that one! The other one!”

 

One of them points his gun at Jim. The rest turn back on John, a few rather confused.

 

“Aren’t these supposed to be the detectives?”

 

“But he’s got a gun.”

 

“Alright, who pressed the alarm.”

 

“Stand down!”

 

“Anyyy second now, Seb,” Jim mutters.

 

And then a smoke bomb goes off.

 

.

 

The front door lock starts to turn, and Jim scrambles to throw off his ugly argyle and ends up grabbing Mycroft’s dumb pajama top before jumping back onto the couch, next to his icebox. 

 

The door opens, and he lets out a breath of relief, fiddling with the Netflix screen until it looks like he’s on episode three of season five, 12 minutes in.

 

“Jim,” Mycroft gives him a smile, and a kiss as he passes by behind the couch. Jim hands him his icebox easily, eyes glued to the screen, as if this was just a  _ casual _ favor. 

 

Mycroft glances at the screen, then gives him a funny look.

 

“Your day went well, then?” he asks.

 

Jim hmms, and thinks it over. Could’ve done without the gunfire, but he was never in any  _ real danger _ . 

 

“More fun with you around,” he says, deciding he should pull the man down and kiss that smile off Mycroft’s dumb face.


	3. Chapter 3

“Jim,” Mycroft says, leaning his chin against his hands, which are folded over that silly umbrella of his he brought everywhere, including this rainy outdoor cafe which  _ already had _ umbrella covers over all the tables.

 

“Yes?” Jim narrows his eyes at Mycroft, because Mycroft is making those eyes at him, the ones that presume laughable innocence, because the man was anything but.

 

“We’ve been together for a year now.”

 

Oh.

 

“A year since…” Mycroft hesitates, thinking for the word. “You know.”

 

A year since Jim gave him back his heart, technically. 

 

“Wait. No. I didn’t see you for three months after that!”

 

“Yes, well I’ve been testing the effects and the lengths at which I can go without, you know-”

 

Jim spits out his coffee.

 

“You  _ what.” _

 

So not fair. Jim wanted to do that. Better question:  _ When _ had  _ Mycroft _ found the time to do that?

 

Mycroft delicately wipes the coffee off his face, and then gives Jim a sardonic look.

 

“It was clearly your fault,” Jim defends vehemently. “You can’t just say something like that.”

 

“Well, fine. If you don’t want me to go with you to Barcelona-”

 

“Wait, wait.”

 

Jim gives him a questioningly look, which Mycroft returns with a pointed one that more or less answered his question.

 

“I’m saying you can do whatever you’d like, with me, in Barcelona,” Mycroft says in slow and quiet, measured tones.

 

Jim stares. For a good long moment.

 

Then he picks up his napkin, and dabs at Mycroft’s forehead, still half-stunned.

 

“You missed a spot,” he says.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> very loosely based on The Snow Queen (very)

Jim blinks awake and knows immediately there’s something wrong. Worse yet, he doesn’t understand how it took him so long to realize it - how he could have possibly slept through this - 

 

The bed is cold.

 

Not just because Mycroft is missing, but the  _ gust _ that blows through the room, through the open doors and windows, brings along with it a dusting of snow. Icicles hang off the corners of the duvet. Jim pushes his hair back, and his hand is wet with melted snow. They were supposed to fly out today. This can’t possibly be a coincidence.

 

Jim wraps himself up haphazardly in a fleece blanket and shudders as he stuffs his feet into slippers so he can go out into the house looking like a homeless refugee and investigate.

 

.

 

The power is out, and Jim is reluctant to leave the house for fear of missing something as soon as he steps out. The security system has been compromised, needless to say, but he had a better chance of figuring out what happened here, than elsewhere in the close confines of a safehouse. 

 

He ends up sitting on a cushion near the front of the house as he types away on his phone, on his laptop, working his contacts to try to get a location on Mycroft Holmes. It’s futile. Mycroft is the sort of person who won’t be found if he doesn’t happen to want to. 

 

The house itself gives him no clues to work with. It smells suspiciously of magic - not because it  _ literally _ had a smell, but the lack of any trace of evidence plus the utter haphazard way their defenses were taken down - that reeks of magic. 

 

Somewhere between 50 and 60 messages, Jim leaps to his feet as if electrocuted, and runs into the kitchen, fleecey blanket forgotten.

 

How on earth did he forget to check the freezer?

 

It turns out to be empty, but he scribbles a cryptic note to stick to the fridge, reminding him to find better security than a  _ refrigerator _ should they need to spontaneously store any organs.

 

(He hopes to hell it’s only empty because it’s  _ with _ Mycroft.)

 

Jim’s phone buzzes. 

 

_ How much for the intel? _

 

Jim grits his teeth and grits out a response.

 

“How...about...as payment...I  _ don’t _ turn you...into...shoes. Send.”

 

His phone buzzes again, this time with a very different response from a different person entirely.

 

_ Who is this? SH _

 

Jim rolls his eyes. Sherlock could be so ostentatious, giving his identity out to any old person. Still, he hadn’t actually meant to send that, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to ask  _ Sherlock _ for help.

 

Still…

 

_ Answer me. I can trace your message, so I’ll soon find out anyway. SH _

 

_ Who are you and what do you know about Mycroft? SH _

 

_ He’s not answering his phone.  _

_ What have you done with him? SH _

 

_ You know how important he is, don’t you? Which means there’ll be so many people looking you won’t have anywhere to hide.  _

_ Do yourself a favor and turn yourself in. SH _

 

It’d be cute how worried Sherlock was, if Jim wasn’t so worried himself. 

 

Jim’s pride wars with his concern for finding Mycroft. Between his network and Sherlock’s, something was bound to turn up wasn’t it? On the other hand, he didn’t quite fancy working with Sherlock and turning this into a whole  _ thing _ . He’d never live it down if it turned out he’d been overreacting and this wasn’t supposed to be a  _ thing _ . Plus. He wasn’t sure Sherlock really understood all the ins and outs of the, well, magical aspect of things.

 

Plus. PLUS. There was that little issue about Sherlock not knowing that Jim was shacked up with his brother. So. 

 

He calls Anthea.

 

Voicemail.

 

That was a good sign, wasn’t it? It meant the two of them were off politicking, didn’t it? If Mycroft had gotten disappeared, via magical means or not, Anthea would still be playing secretary, wouldn’t she?

 

Unless it involved both of them, and she was taken too…

 

“ARGH.” 

 

Jim gives up, and texts Sherlock what he knows.

 

.

 

“Siri? Compose text to: hatman. Hey Sherlock, this is Jim Moriarty. From beyond the grave. Anyway, I’ve kidnapped the British Government, and have yet to decide on the ransom. Good news: if you can figure out where I’ve kept him before I’ve decided, I might not cash it in! You have two hours. Tick-tock! Send text.”

 

Jim is lying on the floor of the sitting room, his head on a throw pillow, his foot under the coffee table, and the blanket still wrapped around him. 

 

If Sherlock thought the threat was real, and came from Moriarty, he’d jump right on the case, wouldn’t he?

 

Jim could only hope the magical kidnapper was as clever (ie, inefficient and needlessly showy) as Sherlock was. God, he hoped the cleverness was genetic, from their mother’s side (ie, the magical one). 

 

From his position on the soft, carpeted ground, Jim can see the ostentatious chandelier - or what should have been an ostentatious chandelier, but was really looked all too much like it really belonged in this big ole house Mycroft had. Figures, his fairy tale boyfriend lives in a fairy tale mansion. Jim wonders if that makes Mycroft a princess or a beast.

 

Jim stares at the multifaceted crystal. It’s too far away for him to see his own reflection look back at him a hundred times or so, but he can pretend. It makes for a poetic backdrop to his mini-existential crisis.

 

Then one of them moves.

 

Jim squints, trying to discern whether it’s a trick of the light, or a breeze from an open window he somehow missed.

 

Then he hears the faintest buzzing sound.

 

A crystal moves.

 

Jim frowns. No a crystal  _ definitely _ moves. It tinkles, knocking into an adjacent hanging shard, and then it - flies out of the chandelier?

 

Jim stands before he realizes, craning his head to follow the thing. It’s looping through the air like some sort of drunken bumblebee and - Jim pulls out his phone to record and get a closer look - it’s shaped like a snowflake. With… wings. Snowflake wings, and a blue and white fuzzy little body.

 

A snowflake bumblebee.

 

“What the fuck,” Jim mouths to himself. 

 

He would very much like to wake up now.

 

Mycroft is magically missing, and now there are snowflake bumblebees.

 

The little guy buzzes and drops down abruptly, then zooms forward and hits the front door. Undettered, the dizzy little thing backs up and tries ramming forward again.

 

“Jesus Christ,” Jim mumbles. He runs off to grab a coat, then rushes to open the door, letting the bee out before dashing off to follow it. 

 

.

 

Jim makes it a block or two before he realizes London’s been blanketed in a snowstorm.

 

In late  _ July _ .

 

The world is white and quiet as a Christmas carol and it’s only when he passes by a sunny cottage with a big front garden that Jim slows down. He curses immediately after, because having taken his eyes off the stupid bee for a moment, it’s gone and blended into the endless white. 

 

“Oh, you poor thing.”

 

“What?” Jim turns to give the speaker an offended look. It’s a woman, with long dark curls and a floppy sun hat garnished with flowers, emerging from the cottage. 

 

Her eyes are a bit familiar, but he can’t quite place them.

 

“Look at you,” she says, voice syrupy. “Running in the snow all barefoot.”

 

Jim looks down. Huh. He hadn’t realized he’d forgotten his shoes.

 

“I…” 

 

Jim frowns. He was in the middle of doing something - something urgent - but it’s slipped his mind.

 

“Why don’t you come in?” she asks gently. “Just for a moment. Just to warm up, and get dry.”

 

He nods, and follows her in.

 

.

 

Jim sips a hot chocolate, sitting at the small round table of the woman’s cottage, looking out her kitchen window.

 

“You’ve 40 different flowers, and a dozen fruit trees,” he says. A shiny red apple hangs just out of reach from one of the trees. 

 

“Yes,” she replies. “Do you garden?”

 

“No.”

 

Jim doesn’t garden. Jim doesn’t care much about flowers, really. Yet it feels like something really obvious is missing from the mix.

 

“Are these tropical?” he asks.

 

“No,” she says with a laugh. “Common varieties, most of them. A few more exotic orchids sure, but I’ve got daisies and tulips and geraniums - the regulars.”

 

“Hm.”

 

Something’s missing.

 

Jim covertly pulls out his phone and, with an eye on the woman, Googles ‘flowers.’

 

He scrolls quickly past the images that pop up, until he comes to the suggested searches. He blinks, then taps on ‘flower meanings.’

 

Red roses, enduring passion. It’s the first one. A common search then. A commonly gifted flower.

 

He looks out the window. 

 

He scoots his chair around the table to get closer to the window, then leans out of it.

 

Roses, roses. Why did it seem like something he’d forgotten but was supposed to know?

 

He cranes his neck around - no sign of roses anywhere.

 

Jim sinks back into his seat just as the woman approaches. She frowns at him, crowding him into a corner. As she looks down at him, her floppy hat tilts down.

 

_ Roses _ .

 

Jim blinks rapidly, as if blinking a filter out of his eyes. The awkward memory of his now-demolished flat being filled to the  _ brim _ by an unwittingly enchanted Mycroft rises and, oh. Mycroft.

 

Yes, quite a big thing to forget. 

 

Jim slams the mug down on the windowsill, so hard that the drink topples over, seeping into the dirt. As the soil soaks up the chocolate, roses start to rise from underground. 

 

“What are you, a fairy? A witch?” Jim accuses. “You’ve enchanted me, haven’t you?”

 

Her expression doesn’t change for a moment - then her face falls immediately, and she starts to sob.

 

“Oh - oh I don’t have time for this!” Jim shouts, pushing past her and out the door. She’s blubbering on about how  _ no one ever stays _ and that’s not really his problem, is it?

 

Outside, there is a swarm of bees, and they ignore the fragrant garden entirely, setting off down the road.

 

_ He’s not here _ , the roses whisper.  _ That means he’s alive. _

 

“What the  _ fuck,” _ Jim whispers to himself again, before running after the bees.

 

.

 

The bees lead Jim to the last place he thought they would: 221B Baker Street. 

 

It’s not until he’s practically at the front door that he even realizes where they’ve gone, and Jim groans, slapping a hand to his face, before begrudgingly stomping up the stairs to show himself in.

 

Inside, however, is completely unexpected.

 

The flat is cold and glazed in snowflakes and icicles, and Sherlock Holmes turns slowly around as if he’d been waiting for Jim’s entrance.

 

Shit, he’s enchanted too, isn’t he?

 

Jim sees immediately that his eyes are an icy blue, not the typical seaglass his eyes should be. It’s an icy blue not unlike the dark-haired woman from the flowery cottage, and something strange is going on.

 

Sherlock raises a hand, calling the bees to him.

 

“They’ve been all over London, but they haven’t found him,” Sherlock says.

 

“You mean Mycroft, right?” Jim asks. Hey, with the world upended by magic like this today, he had to be sure. 

 

Sherlock gives him an impassive look, quite unlike the consulting detective, considering Jim was technically still his biggest archnemesis. Or, deputy nemesis, perhaps, as of their last encounter. 

 

“Oh, you’re finally here,” comes a voice from behind him, and Jim whirls around to see Anthea sitting neatly in Sherlock’s armchair. 

 

“And where were  _ you _ ?” Jim demands. “And if you’re here now, where’s Mycroft?”

 

“Well, yes, that’s because I managed to get away,” Anthea says contritely. 

 

“The Snow Queen has taken him,” she adds, as if that explains  _ anything. _

 

“And I take it not for drag night,” Jim replies in clipped tones. Of course. The  _ Snow Queen has taken him _ . Makes  _ total  _ sense. He glances at Sherlock with a sinking feeling. “He’s not going to remember any of this, is he?” So much for help.

 

“He’s her subject, so she can do whatever she likes, but…”

 

“But?” At this point Jim really just wanted to take a nap.

 

“Her first kiss will numb him from the cold,” she says, and Jim bristles at the thought of anyone else kissing Mycroft, monarch or not. “The second kiss will make him forget. And the third kiss - remember, he’s mostly human, it makes him vulnerable - the third kiss might kill him.”

 

“ _ I _ might kill him,” Jim grumbles, “Mycroft and his stupid fairy tale problems.”

 

Jim pulls together his resolve - he doesn’t like asking for help, but it’s all he’s done all day. Once more won’t hurt.

 

“Will you help me save him, then?”

 

Anthea gives him a small smile.

 

“You’re doing quite well already, really. You’ve confessed your love for Mycroft to Sherlock, which counts well enough as a public declaration. And at his sister’s, you passed yet another test when the power of your love allowed you to remember. Things like this come in threes, so now that you’ve convinced the world, and yourself, next it’ll like be the final test, where you likely have to convince Mycroft of the power of love.”

 

Jim stares at her.

 

“And then after I kill him, I’m going to kill you,” he says darkly.

 

.

 

Jim has learned from his previous  _ ridiculous _ attempts at chasing bees while looking like a hobo. Let Mycroft fend off kisses himself. Jim was going to get a proper winter expedition outfit this time. 

 

Now that he’d warmed up indoors and wrangled a full mission briefing out of Anthea, he wasn’t going to go in unprepared. Snow boots, a fur-lined hooded parka, gloves, the whole shebang. And he was getting a cab to follow the bees in.

 

The Holmeses may be made of ice, but Jim is not. He is still susceptible to frostbite.

 

.

 

Jim ends up having to steal a cab to drive himself, but no matter. It came outfitted with chains on the wheels and everything. 

 

He briefly wonders if he should have stolen a horse instead. He immediately shoves the thought aside.

 

The bees lead Jim up to a castle that seemed to have erupted from the snow itself, carved out of ice, standing where Buckingham Palace should be.

 

There isn’t a single trace of the Royal Guard.

 

Instead, there are nymphs and muses in the classical sculptural style littered across the lawn - carved not from stone, but ice.

 

“Next we’re going to see Yeti patrolling the moat,” Jim mutters as he shifts into park.

 

.

 

The palace is a labyrinthine sort of monument, so Jim sends the little bee-drones ahead. He’s had each tiny spot of flying fuzz attached with sensors, and as they fly throughout the castle it maps out a blueprint on Jim’s phone.

 

At the heart of the palace, deep in the center, there is something colder than anything else.

 

“Guess that’s where we’re going,” Jim tells a stray bee with a sigh. “God, now I’m talking to bees. Is this what Sherlock’s like?”

 

It’s a long walk of twisty turns, and it’s only thanks to the fact that the palace staff - or at least, that’s what he assumes the many ice sculptures littered around the palace are - are not animated, that they make it to the inner chambers. 

 

When he finally does, he nearly doesn’t recognize the man standing over a large, long table, looking down at a map and puzzle pieces with a glass.

 

It’s Mycroft.

 

Mycroft, dusted in snow, and looking every bit the iceman Jim used to think he was. 

 

At the head of the table a woman with long, white hair, straight and fine all the way down to the floor, reclines in a high backed chair. The tall crown on her head marks her queen, and elongates her already inhumanly tall body to intimidating heights. 

 

“Myc, dear, what goes in E-7?” she asks, and Jim winces. Her voice isn’t loud, per se, but it grates like shards of ice mashing together, creating a cacophony of unpleasant frequencies.

 

Mycroft walks over to her with a puzzle piece, before picking up a drafting compass to create some arc on the map.

 

“Mycroft!”

 

Jim runs over, but Mycroft only glances at him before moving around the table to the other end, where he marks off yet another box. On the table is a complicated map that seems to be some sort of geography game, and it looks only about half-finished.

 

“Mycroft,” Jim says again, impatient. “We have to go. Let’s get out of here.”

 

He ignores him.

 

“MI5 is looking for you!” he tries in frustration. “You’re wasting taxpayer dollars, hiding out in this oversized igloo.”

 

Mycroft barely looks at him.

 

“What is wrong with you?” He turns to the white woman. “What is wrong with him? What have you done?”

 

“Myc, dear, who is this little noisy fellow?” the queen asks, talking over Jim.

 

“I have no idea, madam.”

 

Jim stops. 

 

Then he grabs the protractor from where it was lying beside Mycroft’s hand, and glares at the queen, threatening to jam the pointy bit down into the map to rip it.

 

She finally looks at him.

 

“I need Myc to help me with this little puzzle; I was told, by his mother, that he is rather good at maths. And he is!” She applauds briefly, and he bows. “I told him I would release him if he could accomplish the task.”

 

Then she smiles, smug. “And I said I would give him a pair of skates.”

 

Jim is ludicrously offended.

 

“Don’t call him that!” he snaps. “And you can’t just - just  _ kidnap  _ my fiance because you’re too stupid to finish your own stupid Sudoku puzzles!”

 

He grabs the map as he shouts this, haphazardly pulling it into his arms and crinkling the thing as he does - halfway through he gives up, bats at it madly as it fails to roll into a scroll, then positively  _ gives up _ , and rips the damn thing. It’s - cathartic actually - and then he’s tearing it in long pieces, ripping it to shreds. 

 

Jim huffs.

 

Neither of them have batted an eye at his brief tantrum.

 

“Are you done now?” the woman asks. She finally frowns. It’s something, but it’s not enough.

 

“No, I’m  _ not done _ ,” Jim says, making a mockingly disgusted face at her. Then he stomps over to Mycroft and grabs his face.

 

“This better work,” Jim says, fingers trembling, and then he kisses him.

“Oh.”

 

Mycroft’s eyes go wide, and he stares at Jim. He stares and he stares, and then recognition dawns - where he is, what happened, and who the man standing before him is.

 

“Yes,  _ oh _ ,” Jim says, tearing up a little as Mycroft smiles at him in really a  _ much too _ sentimental way for someone who is supposed to be made of ice. It’s been a horrible day and what kind of looney would Jim be if he found it all alright just because of a silly little smile? 

 

Jim wants to punch him in the gut and gripe about the terrible ills he’s suffered. He also wants to throw his arms around Mycroft and hug the life out of him.

 

“You’re - you’re really a  _ very _ high maintenance boyfriend, you know that?” is what comes out instead. 

 

Mycroft looks down at Jim. He’s drowning in a massive parka, with a fur-lined hood encircling his face, which is a bit flushed with the cold. There is ice in his lashes, and his nose is a bit runny. 

 

It’s a bit adorable.

 

So he puts his hands on either side of Jim’s face, leans down, and kisses him.

 

“You called me your fiance,” he murmurs to a still-dazed looking Jim.

 

“Huh?”

 

“Did you propose while I wasn’t around? Or?”

 

Jim turns even redder, and rubs his nose with the back of his hand, muttering something while looking at his feet.

 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

 

Jim glares at him, seeming to have mustered up his senses thanks to mounting frustration.

 

“I had this whole thing planned! Barcelona! And then you - you had to get all magically kidnapped! In July! You brought a snowstorm to Britain in July! What kind of government are you?”

 

Mycroft’s mouth twitches, but he feels he deserves credit for not laughing at the ridiculous string of phrases, and he knows he probably shouldn’t, given all the trouble Jim has been put through because of him. For him.

 

“Let me make it up to you,” he says. Jim gives him a curious look. “Come on, let’s go home.”

 

As they make their way out of the castle, the snow starts to melt.

 

“When you say home…”

 

Mycroft blinks. Of course he means his home, the house he’s been living in for most of his years in London. The home the two of them - ah. He’s never actually formally asked Jim to move in, but after a string of demolished buildings, it just seemed like Jim had ran out of safehouses. And frankly, it’s more convenient. For both of them. 

 

And Mycroft  _ likes _ having Jim close.

 

“Well.” Mycroft worries at his lip. “What’s mine is yours. Or it will be, soon enough anyway, won’t it?”

 

He glances over at Jim, who’s turned red anew. Mycroft puts his hand on Jim’s forehead, just to tease.

 

“I wonder if you’re coming down with a fever,” he says seriously, and Jim swats his hand away. 

 

“See if I propose now,” he huffs. But then Mycroft laughs, and he can’t not smile in reply.

 


End file.
